1. Venom: The Last Dance
Sony Pictures | NEW
$51M Domestic Opening Weekend
$175M Global Cume
Overall box office was down from last year for a third frame in a row as Sony’s trilogy capper Venom: The Last Dance opened to a disappointing $51M on 4,131 screens for a Per Screen Average of $12,346, despite being the biggest October opener of 2024. This is far below even our panel’s lowest forecast for the threequel and marks the weakest opening performance in the trilogy, whose previous two entries debuted to $80.2M and $90M, respectively. The Venom franchise as a whole has now climbed to $1.5B worldwide. Here’s how the estimated 3-Day looked…
- Friday – $22M
- Saturday – $16.825M
- Sunday – $12.175M
For comparison, The Last Dance also opened below MCU low-grossers Ant-Man ($57.2M) and The Incredible Hulk ($55.4M), as well as the DCEU’s The Flash ($55M) and Shazam! ($53.5M). Of those groupings the best point of comparison is Shazam!, which had a much lower budget in the $90M-$100M arena, not too far from reported individual costs for all three Venom movies.
The Venom trilogy is by its very nature B-movie oriented, so it’s neither a shock nor a likely audience deterrent that critics gave the new one 36% on Rotten Tomatoes (compared to 30% and 57% for the previous two, respectively). Audience score was 79% (compared to previous 80%/84%), so we’re par for the course there as well. CinemaScore earned a “B-,” while PostTrak parents and kids rating was 5-out-of-5.
A big reason Venom is sputtering domestically could be how agnostic general moviegoers feel about this pocket Sony universe within the larger Marvel tapestry (most of which is now controlled by Disney). While we won’t spoil The Last Dance, it does leave open future possibilities for several characters, some of whom are on the periphery of even this film. A few of those in the fan press have wondered if there is any real interest in the future of such obscure, bottom-of-the-barrel comics IP ala Madame Web. Spider-Man is an A character, Venom is a solid B character, but mention “Knull” to most 12-year-old boys and you’ll get a blank stare. Despite some previous cameos, these films have yet to pay off any connections within the larger Multiverse Saga of the MCU which might stir the need-to-see factor ala a Tom Hardy/Tom Holland matchup. Spider-Man is not even mentioned in The Last Dance. As far as the layman moviegoer is likely concerned, Sony’s continued mining of C-level material makes this new film seem like more of an epilogue/less an event for the overall Sony Spider-Verse movies. As Padme said in Revenge of the Sith, “You’re going down a path I can’t follow.”
However, it’s a whole different ballgame overseas, where the movie made $124M on 53,700+ screens across 64 markets for an overall global tally of $175M. That’s the third biggest like market international opening of the year behind Inside Out 2 and Deadpool & Wolverine.
Alongside Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, the second Venom movie Let There Be Carnage was one of two major Marvel features that did not get a China release in 2021 due to COVID (and possible political) concerns. For whatever reason, Venom: The Last Dance was allowed to run wild in the Middle Kingdom where it took in $46M over 5 days ($6M from IMAX screens), becoming China’s biggest superhero bow since Spider-Man: Far From Home as well as their biggest Hollywood opening of 2024. The first Venom opened to $107.6M there in 2018 on its way to a $270M market cume.
Other top foreign markets include Mexico ($7.3M), South Korea ($5.8M), the UK ($5.7M), India ($4.7M), and Germany ($4.1M). There was also $16M in global IMAX box office, only $4.8M of which came from North America. Clearly Venom is a brand which travels, and the more off-brand nature of these movies is less of a deterrent. No matter how things shake out stateside the studio will clearly do well with this title globally.
3. Conclave
Focus Features | NEW
$6.5M Domestic Opening Weekend
Directed by Edward Berger of 2022’s Oscar-winning All Quiet on the Western Front, the papacy-themed mystery thriller Conclave took in an estimated $6.5M domestically from 1,753 theaters to take the #3 spot for a $3,708 PSA. However, it is currently in a dead heat with The Wild Robot (from Focus parent company Universal) which also has an estimated $6.5M, so it won’t be until Monday actuals when we can officially call the chart placement.
Here’s how the 3-Day looked…
- Friday – $2.5M
- Saturday – $2.3M
- Sunday – $1.7M
Conclave is on track for potential award season attention having received a Rotten Tomatoes critical score of 92%. Audience score was 82%, with a “B+” CinemaScore and 4 out of 5 from PostTrak audiences, the latter of which gave it a 61% definite recommend. Exit polls showed 77% of the audience was 35+, with New York and Los Angeles posting the two strongest markets, respectively. Ticket buyers were split 54% male/46% female.
Let’s take a look at how demographics played out…
- 67% White
- 13% Latino
- 8% Asian
- 6% Black
- 6% NatAm/Other
With a stacked cast of solid acting vets including Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci, Isabella Rossellini, and John Lithgow, Focus Features made this a destination film for older audiences this frame despite this being material you would likely see on a streamer or cable network these days.
Other Notable Performances
Neon’s slow rollout of Sean Baker’s Anora continued to pay dividends as it earned $867,142K this frame on 34 screens for a PSA of $25,504, over double Venom: The Last Dance‘s PSA. This was enough to put the indie feature at #8, ahead of Focus Features’ floundering animated Pharrell Williams doc Piece by Piece. The Anora domestic cume is currently at $1.6M for the critically-praised drama.
As of this weekend Warner Bros. is reporting that Beetlejuice Beetlejuice has now taken in $288.7M domestically, placing it ahead of March’s Dune: Part Two as the studio’s top stateside earner of 2024. The overseas grosses are not comparable, though, as the Tim Burton movie only did about half that business ($150.1M) in other markets. In other WB news, Joker: Folie à Deux managed to cross the $200M milestone with $201.1M globally, with slightly less that 3/4’s of that coming from overseas. This makes it on-par with the global gross of 2020’s Birds of Prey, a much lower-budgeted affair ($82M) whose release coincided with the opening salvo of the COVID-19 epidemic.
Sunday’s Studio Weekend Estimates | Weekend 43 – 2024
Total 3-Day Domestic Estimates: $91,906,369M | (-27.3% vs 2023)
| Title | Weekend Estimate | % Change | Locations | Location Change | PSA | Domestic Total | Week | Distributor |
| Venom: The Last Dance | $51,000,000 | 4,131 | $12,346 | $51,000,000 | 1 | Sony Pictures | ||
| Smile 2 | $9,400,000 | -59% | 3,624 | 5 | $2,594 | $40,714,000 | 2 | Paramount Pi… |
| Conclave | $6,500,000 | 1,753 | $3,708 | $6,500,000 | 1 | Focus Features | ||
| The Wild Robot | $6,500,000 | -36% | 3,427 | -402 | $1,897 | $111,368,000 | 5 | Universal |
| We Live in Time | $4,848,132 | 15% | 2,964 | +1,979 | $1,636 | $11,760,401 | 3 | A24 |
| Terrifier 3 | $4,770,505 | -49% | 2,720 | -42 | $1,754 | $44,527,900 | 3 | Cineverse |
| Beetlejuice Beetlejuice | $3,230,000 | -35% | 2,874 | -377 | $1,124 | $288,744,000 | 8 | Warner Bros. |
| Anora | $867,142 | 58% | 34 | 28 | $25,504 | $1,619,582 | 2 | Neon |
| Piece by Piece | $720,110 | -65% | 1,298 | -575 | $555 | $8,883,000 | 3 | Focus Features |
| Transformers One | $720,000 | -64% | 1,422 | -747 | $506 | $57,946,000 | 6 | Paramount Pi… |
| Joker: Folie à Deux | $600,000 | -72% | 1,243 | -1,614 | $483 | $57,833,000 | 4 | Warner Bros. |
| Saturday Night | $575,000 | -66% | 1,151 | -1,185 | $500 | $8,877,000 | 5 | Sony Pictures |
| Your Monster | $515,000 | 651 | $791 | $515,000 | 1 | Vertical Ent… | ||
| The Nightmare Before Christmas | $507,000 | -59% | 650 | -1,210 | $780 | $93,435,457 | 1,620 | Walt Disney |
| Hocus Pocus | $363,000 | -58% | 1,595 | 115 | $228 | $50,559,912 | 1,633 | Walt Disney |
| Speak No Evil | $180,000 | -63% | 601 | -206 | $300 | $36,750,000 | 7 | Universal |
| Goodrich | $165,260 | -74% | 655 | -400 | $252 | $1,210,032 | 2 | Ketchup Ente… |
| White Bird: A Wonder Story | $140,000 | -54% | 254 | -272 | $551 | $4,248,505 | 4 | Lionsgate |
| Deadpool & Wolverine | $137,000 | -79% | 300 | -1,225 | $457 | $636,642,810 | 14 | Walt Disney |
| Memoir of a Snail | $69,000 | 5 | $13,800 | $69,000 | 1 | IFC Films | ||
| My Hero Academia the Movie: You’re Next | $66,500 | -90% | 155 | -1,435 | $429 | $4,983,348 | 3 | Toho Interna… |
| Am I Racist? | $11,900 | -68% | 36 | -52.00 | $331 | $12,289,650 | 7 | SDG Releasing |
| A Different Man | $8,843 | -48% | 23 | -12.00 | $384 | $642,121 | 6 | A24 |
| The Front Room | $7,036 | -49% | 17 | -2.00 | $414 | $3,601,964 | 8 | A24 |
| Faith of Angels | $3,747 | -49% | 12 | -10 | $312 | $563,204 | 7 | Purdie Distr… |
| Tokyo Cowboy | $1,194 | -43% | 2 | n/c | $597 | $140,628 | 9 | Purdie Distr… |
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